My Spring Break vacation started extra early on Sunday. Since my flight was leaving at 6:40am on Sunday, and I have a nasty tendency to oversleep, I decided NOT to go to bed on Saturday night. I intended to spend the evening/morning packing, cleaning and paying bills. Instead, I wound up watching lots of tv, and before I realized it, it was 4am and I hadn't packed a thing. So I began to hustle, but the lack of sleep was definitely taking its toll. I didn't make it out of the house until 5:30am, so I was fairly concerned that I was going to miss my flight. Fortunately, the roads were empty so I made it safely and on-time - thank goodness I hadn't planned to check any bags!
Once I was on the plane, I kept an eye out for one of the other people making the trip. According to the spreadsheet, Byron was on my flight, but since I had never met him before, I just stared at all the males in their 20s-30s boarding the plane, trying to figure out who he was. I was kind of tired though, so I just hunched over with my hands over my eyes for a bit. After a few minutes, I sat up and was pretty much blinded by the plane lights, so I slumped back in my seat, but continued to look at everyone boarding the plane. At that moment there happened to be a bit of a traffic jam, and I notice this guy staring at me. So I look at his jacket and notice that it says "Michigan Ross School of Business." So I said: "Are you Byron?" to which he replied "Geraldine" and we did the polite handshake-thing that MBAs are so adept at. It wasn't until a little later that I found out that apparently I looked half-dead, with my mouth open and staring off into space when Byron first noticed me. Ask him for an imitation... he seems to love doing it.
Both flights went smoothly, although there was some questionable loud noise when we landed in Charlotte that I wasn't too thrilled with. I think our pilot had to use the emergency EMERGENCY brake to get us to stop before we ran out of runway. Byron and I chatted during our layover, and he seemed surprised I was Puerto Rican, because "I didn't have huge hoop earrings." I'm not sure where exactly he gets his information. After we landed at the SJU airport we headed our separate ways because I was going to visit Abuela. I hopped in my 7-person white Kia Rondo (which came very in handy during the week) and immediately started freaking out about the quality of driving. But I gathered my bearings quickly and enjoyed the sights on the way to Abuela's, including the ginormous Best Buy they built right by Plaza. Since I didn't have lunch, I stopped for a snack at TACO MAKER. Honestly? Just as good as I remembered. Once I made it to the neighborhood, I called Mom and sat outside our former house for a few minutes, dissecting every change they've made since it was sold. Holy crap, the house looked really good! I spent a few hours at Abuela's chatting about school and life and etc, and had dinner with her and Titi (arroz con gandules, biftec encebollado and amarillos).
Once I left Abuela's I headed to our rental house for the next four days. Byron was already there, and the next wave of arrivals (including our trip planners, Ginny and Lakshmi) were on their way. Once we were read the house rules, we all started claiming sleeping space and Meryl (fellow Section Sixer and the person I knew best on the trip) and I wound up in a bedroom in the upstairs villa. Everyone was starved, so 7 of us hopped in the Rondo, and headed to a restaurant recommended to us by the owners of the rental unit. After we sat down, we all took a look at the menu and had a collective heart attack. The prices were absurdly expensive and in no way close to what we wanted to spend. So I told our waiter a little white lie, claiming that due to a miscommunication, our group was elsewhere and we needed to meet them. So we headed out, but not before I spent $3 on a diet coke. Out of a can. Served in a plastic cup. After lots of driving around (and with random stops at Kasalta and Walgreens), we finally found a 24 hour diner by the house, and a mere 4 hours after we left the house in search of dinner, we finally finished eating. So we headed back to the villa for some relaxing, partying, and to top it all off, getting yelled at by our neighbor, a local who had to wake up for work at 5:30am the next morning. I guess it's really tough to shut up 28 MBA's who are boozing it up on Spring Break.
Next installment: Monday's Beach Mayhem
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